Eritrea announced Thursday evening that it was severing “all diplomatic relations” with Ethiopia, following the closure of Ethiopia’s embassy in Asmara and the expulsion of 10 Eritrean diplomats, who were declared “personae non gratae.”
Addis Ababa accused Eritrea, Sudan and Egypt of supporting an opposition alliance led by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, or TPLF, which has been fighting forces loyal to the Ethiopian government since last week. The three countries deny supporting the rebels. Explosions were heard overnight in Addis Ababa, possibly following a drone strike, raising fears of an escalation in the fighting in northern Ethiopia and of the conflict spreading.
Ethiopian government forces march on the town of Amada, which was captured from the Tigray rebels
(Video: Reuters)
The clashes mark the most serious escalation in Ethiopia since the end of the 2020-2022 civil war, in which hundreds of thousands of people were killed. Eritrea fought alongside Ethiopia’s federal government in that conflict. Relations between the two countries had been restored in 2018 after being severed during a military conflict between the neighbors from 1998 to 2000.
Ethiopia’s Foreign Ministry said it had “decided to close its embassy in Asmara in response to Eritrea’s direct and indirect hostile and aggressive acts against Ethiopia.” The statement said 10 Eritrean diplomats had been ordered to leave Ethiopia within 48 hours.
Eritrea’s information minister told Reuters that the expulsion of the diplomats effectively amounted to the closure of the Eritrean Embassy in Addis Ababa.
“We were left with no choice but to respond in kind and sever all diplomatic relations with Ethiopia,” Eritrea’s Foreign Ministry said.
A source linked to the rebels told Reuters that they had carried out drone attacks in Addis Ababa, including against the military headquarters. If confirmed, it would be the first known drone attack by anti-government forces on the Ethiopian capital, located hundreds of kilometers from the front lines.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday advised Israelis not to travel to Ethiopia’s Tigray, Amhara and Afar regions or to the Danakil Desert. So far, however, no warning has been issued against travel to Addis Ababa.
According to the ministry, the advisory was issued amid the deteriorating security situation in northern Ethiopia, the renewed armed clashes in Tigray, their expansion into parts of Afar and the continuing fighting in Amhara.
“The security situation in the north of the country is unstable and may change rapidly and without prior warning,” the ministry said. “The armed clashes, together with movement restrictions, roadblocks and road closures, as well as the suspension of civilian flights to and from Tigray, could significantly hamper movement and options for leaving the area.”
Earlier this week, Ethiopian government forces scored a significant gain in the fighting that resumed last week against rebels in the northern Tigray region, capturing a strategic town near the regional capital, Mekelle.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed receives his Nobel Peace Prize in 2019
(Photo: AFP)
The army loyal to Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and a local militia allied with him said they had taken control of Alamata, about 120 kilometers south of the rebel stronghold in Mekelle.
Abiy is facing an alliance of several rebel organizations opposed to his government in Ethiopia, a country made up of about 80 ethnic groups, four years after the end of the bloody civil war against Tigrayan rebels.
Alamata is an important supply hub for food and fuel and lies in southern Tigray along the border with neighboring Amhara, where fighting is also underway between rebels and government forces.
Another neighboring region where clashes have been reported in recent days is Afar. There, rebels were reported this week to have made gains by capturing the town of Arbati, about 60 kilometers south of Tigray.
Ethiopia’s civil war began in 2020 between the federal army and allied militias on one side and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front on the other.
Tigrayans had been the dominant force in national Ethiopian politics for decades, until Abiy came to power in 2018 following a broad wave of protests. They later felt increasingly marginalized and stripped of their former status.
The war that erupted after they rebelled against the federal government is estimated to have caused one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters in recent years, with at least 500,000 people killed, whether directly in fighting and violence or as a result of disease or hunger.
More than 1 million of Tigray’s roughly 6 million residents fled their homes, while the region’s economy suffered massive destruction and its health system collapsed.
The war ended in November 2022 with the Pretoria Agreement, which was intended to bring the conflict to a close. But some of its provisions were never implemented, and tensions gradually returned and intensified.
By the beginning of this year, a brief new round of fighting had already been reported in Tigray.
In May, the TPLF ousted the local administration that had been appointed to govern the northern region under the Pretoria Agreement. In June, the Tigrayan rebels, together with Ethiopia’s main opposition parties, boycotted national elections won by Abiy’s ruling party.
Both sides accused each other of violating the peace agreement, and since August there have also been reports of renewed airstrikes by Abiy’s military against Tigrayan forces.
Tensions peaked last Sunday, when the TPLF announced the formation of an alliance with six other armed groups waging their own insurgencies in Ethiopia, including the Oromo Liberation Army, or OLA, and the Fano militia from Amhara, with the declared goal of toppling Abiy’s government.
Three days after the alliance was formed, Tigrayan rebels launched a large-scale offensive against government forces and said they were waging a “total defensive war” against Abiy, a former Nobel Peace Prize laureate.